


The Way Wolves Sing

by bravelikealady



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: F/M, sansan
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-16
Updated: 2016-03-16
Packaged: 2018-05-27 04:02:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,655
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6268816
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bravelikealady/pseuds/bravelikealady
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It is not always a pretty thing, to have your heart made into that of a queen...</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Way Wolves Sing

 

 

Struggling to breathe and fighting not to feel, Sansa charged from the room and looked out onto the world for the first time in too long. The sun rose behind her, making the shards of a charred Winterfell its canvas, uncaring of how sacred the juxtaposed black sky and white earth was to her. As golden as the lions that had first torn at her heart, it seared her head from behind, her auburn hair darker and more easily cooked from weeks without sunlight, and blinded her from the front.  _ The gold cannot touch me here. The gold is not the truth of it. _ All was frost and she felt the cold in every fiber of her being; cold air filled her lungs and climbed out of her in icy tendrils, down her fingers and through her nails, extending from every eyelash, weighing down her bottom lip with smokey conviction. But this was the cold she had striven for, the cold that was her home. She was a winter flower; she belonged underground, thinking, plotting, growing, biding her time. Stark women had never possessed blooms only for show. The Stark women were flowers as they were wolves; they thrived in packs, they were hardly visible, but they had watched their prey closely, and would close in only when the moment was right. By the time you noticed the beauty of a Stark woman, it was too late, no matter the context. She tossed off her cloak and gripped the stone wall tight.  The cold could not be denied and neither could the North; Sansa would be Queen. The She-Wolf would rule. It wasn’t a choice any more than finally succumbing to her tears was. For so long, she had been holding them in, putting on a brave face. She did not want to face her fears, she did not want to be weak, she did not want to be the little girl who shamed the Winterfell snows the last time she was here, so naive, so eager to be put up in some hot house, so desperate to be liked. As she gave in to silent sobs and began to chastise herself, she heard his voice in her head, like she had so many times before.  _ Don’t be me, girl… Just feel it. It’s the fear that kills, not the pain. I learned that too late, you don’t have to. Fears for dogs, but you’re better than that. You’re a wolf, always have been.  _  He had laughed then.  _ My little bird is a big, bad wolf. Best not let the fear make you ugly. No one wants a queen who looks like me. _

  


Sandor, her one true knight whether either of them liked it or not, was not laughing now. Now, he lay behind the doors she’d just run from, in the bed that had once been her own, dying.  When she saw him in the Godswood so many months ago, she’d thought she’d been dreaming, thought in her final death throes his ghost had come to make her brave or that the Lannisters had condemned him to being a hound of hell somehow and he’d come to carry her off. It was only when he moved with such urgency at her and had cried out NO that she realized that it truly was him. Sansa had closed her eyes as he scooped her up, the world growing dark as she looked into his eyes, brimming with tears, but for once not consumed by hate. Sandor had saved her then, making her the sole survivor of Littlefinger’s attempted coup of King’s Landing. The day she woke was the last time she’d cried, though not even then did she cry as hard as she did now. She had heard the crackling of fire before she opened her eyes. When they did open, she had seen him, only in breeches, too tall for the room they were in, his broad shoulders caped by his hair that was much longer and wavier than it was the last time she’d seen him, bent over a basin, scrubbing dirt off of his face and chest. She smiled as she watched him, blurry-eyed and warm, as if she were in a dream. She began to feel her body, the crown of her head, the tips of her toes, and everything in between. She felt a pressure on her hip and saw a willowy girl lying diagonally on the too-firm bed, a head of dark hair cushioned on the blankets. It was the nose that did it, made Sansa realize she was alive and that this was all real; that nose was a nose she loved, a nose that had graced the long faces of her father and her half-brother Jon and… “Arya…” she had gasped, her voice more a crackle and a cry than she meant for it to be. The Hound had tilted his head toward her eagerly and then, wide-eyed and smiling, laughed the biggest laugh she’d ever heard. As Arya woke from the noise, jumped up, and grabbed the dagger at her waist, Sandor had dropped to his knees by her bed. He kissed her head, the water dripping off his face and chest from where he had stopped his washing suddenly, and slid one huge hand under her neck, his fingers tangling into her hair. His right hand swallowed her left and squeezed firm but gentle, then eased, his thumb caressing her knuckles.

  


“She’s awake?” Arya had asked, sharp and pointed, the way Arya’s word always were, but softer now, too, than Sansa had remembered, and deeper. More a lady’s voice than a child’s. 

  


“Yes!” She had cried out. “I’m awake, I’m alive.” 

  


She had sobbed then, Sandor sitting on the bed and scooping her into his arms again. Arya, sitting at the foot of the bed and chewing her lip, then smiling, her eyes full of tears that she did not let fall. She looked afraid that it was not real or that Sansa was an icicle she might melt or break. Sansa used what energy she had to thrust an arm out and simply take Arya’s hand, and they all three began laughing. Snowflakes hit Sansa’s eyelashes and she was snapped back from that memory, back to reality, here, now, the ruins of Winterfell, bent over, now audibly sobbing. She gave out a few more brisk, rattling cries, and then breathed deeply, kicking the stone wall over and over until the pain in her foot was greater than the emotional pain in her chest. Then she remembered how she had told them that she wanted to fight, how they both kneeled to her and asked her to do what Robb could not. She remembered getting on her own knees then, her small family in a hidden tent, and saying she never wanted that, that she only wanted to make way for a better age. She remembered a hundred nights after that, Sandor’s face in every one of them. She remembered him teaching her to hold off big men like himself with just a wooden practice sword. She remembered him giving her a sword of her own, named Eddard, and a dagger called Catelyn. She remembered taking down a wild wolf with him and the wild and blood-stained embrace that had followed its final howl. She remembered understanding what it was to howl, she remembered dreaming again.  She remembered a thousand kisses, a hundred fights, and a dozen full silences. She remembered searching the South for men who could be loyal to her, for men to train. She remembered training alongside them, she and Arya.  

 

She remembered the plan… the plan that had brought them to this…  _ I told him it had to be him alone to fight Gregor. I made him do that. I only wanted to make him brave, the way he’d made me brave so many times before. I did not think… _ They had known it was a trap from the moment they entered the Red Keep. It was too easy, it was too quiet. Arya had used a cat to get into the Throne room and report back to them. It was only Cersei and Robert Strong in that room. Only.  

  


“I can’t beat him, girl. I never could. Anger used to make me blind. Don’t have that luxury anymore, bloody Brothers.”

  


“You can beat him. And you will.”         

  


He laughed at her, bitterly, sounding almost the way he had so long before.  

  


“I mean it, Sandor.” 

  


His smile faded then. Even with all they had been through, that was the first time she’d said his name. Arya still called him the Hound and Sansa never said a name at all. Mostly she’d called him “ser” and bit her lip, watching the instinctual annoyance fade to amusement. She loved that game, but it also kept a wall between her and her most faithful captain. He looked directly into her eyes, seeing past everything she had ever hoped to throw up in defense, penetrating her. His mouth twitched and he moved to speak, but she placed her hand in his and he hushed. 

  


“You can beat him this time because now… now you can see. You’re mine, Sandor. Show them you’re not their Hound, show them you are no dog. Do this for me. I need to know I’m not making a mistake in naming you Captain of my Queensguard.” 

  


“My lady…” 

  


“Yes. I am. Yours.” 

  


She had pulled his forehead down to hers, breaking eye contact before she could cry, and kissed him lightly on the lips. She then pulled a pearl direwolf’s head from within her half-hauberk and pinned it to the collar of his tunic that peeked above his armor, then tucked it down.  

  


“Would I could be your wolf…” 

  


“You will be.” 

  


In the end, Sandor had won, but not without injury. How they had made it to Winterfell, she did not know. She felt him dying in every breath she heard, in every touch they shared. When they made camp, he would wander off alone. He whimpered in his sleep. He would not let her tend his wounds; he would not even let her see them. 

When they had finally made it to Winterfell, he was gaunt and grey, unable to raise his voice above more than a whisper. It was in the Great Hall of Winterfell that he had fallen, his knees curling under him. Sansa’s heart had stopped as she ran to his side, kneeling. In the center of the room, she had held him, looked into his eyes as she begged the old gods and the new not to let her rock crumble to ash as the burned stones of Winterfell had.  _ Let me keep him… He is all I ask for. I will earn the rest, I will suffer my lot, please. _ He slumped forward then, his forehead resting on hers. 

  


“Little Bird…” 

  


Arya had stepped forward then. “Let me take him to the m-” 

  


“Leave us.” 

  


“Sansa, don’t be stu-” 

  


Sansa pulled her face away from Sandor then, raising herself as straight as she could, looking into Arya’s face harder than she ever had before. “Leave, Arya. Please. For just a moment. Lead everyone outside. Please.”

  


The last word had come out small and scared, as if she were the blood-free child from the last feast this hall held. Arya saw the fear in her sister’s eyes and nodded, walking back to the men who had followed the Starks home, leading them out into the yard. Sansa turned her attention back to Sandor, who now rested his heavy head on her left shoulder. She wrapped one hand around his shoulder, the other gripped the nape of his neck. She felt him shudder and then breathe in, deeply, felt him turn his nose to the crook of her neck, covered by her thick hair, Tully in color, but Northron and wild from a week and a half of riding. She felt him struggle to lift his head, placing his big hands on the floor for support. His dark eyes looked into her bright ones and a slow smile spread across his face.  “I’m glad I get to die surrounded by your scent, She-wolf.” 

  


“Don’t talk like that.” 

  


“I’m done… I’m done, girl.” 

  


“I command you NOT to speak this way…” 

  


“Let the little Stark pup run your Queensguard. She can start after she helps you lug my body to some nice burial spot-” 

  


A sudden desperation took her over and she let out a wordless cry, strong and icy, and slapped him across the face. He chuckled, softly, then sighed. “I do not think a man can be beaten back to life more than once.” 

  


She buried her face in his chest and let a single tear fall. He did his best to comfort her, but he was weak. She felt guilty for not being strong. 

  


“Look at me, girl.” 

  


She did not heed him, only pressed her face harder against him, tugging at his tunic as to feel as much of his flesh against her own as she could. 

  


“Sansa. Look at me.” 

  


A chill ran down her spine at the sound of her name; Now he was breaking the rules. She kissed him lightly on the chest and then up his neck before pulling back to look at him, his tunic still held tightly in her clenched fists. She swallowed and set her jaw, determined to be brave for him. 

  


“You gave me a short, sweet life. All I ever did… was help you to this long, hard reign… I wish…” 

  


He stopped speaking and pinched her chin with his hand, but softly, and just looked at her for a moment, before closing his eyes. She could tell he was trying to hide a grimace of pain. She pretended not to see. 

  


“People will say a lot of things about me-” 

  


“I will not let them-” 

  


“Hush, girl."  

  


He fell over once again and Sansa dropped down, pulling at him until his back was on her chest. She wrapped her arms around his chest and he took her hands in his, kissing them, then lying them on his chest. "If they say I loved at all, they’ll say I loved you. You did not just sing for me. You did me one better. You wrote my song. You wrote my song when I never thought to have one…” 

  


His breath was growing more and more shallow. 

  


“Sansa… I… I…” 

  


He had been in her bed since that moment. He had not woken, he had not spoken. His fever had come and gone. Sometimes he would mumble incoherently. Sansa did see his wounds then, for she treated them herself. She would watch as he had nightmares; Powerless, she would take his hand and drift into her own dream, reliving the Battle of Blackwater over and over, wondering how things could have turned out differently… Sansa finally brought herself to go back inside. She picked her cloak up off of the ground and pushed open the doors. She dismissed the maester. Gently, she climbed under the covers and laid herself over Sandor. Her head on his chest, she felt the heave and fall of his last breath, heard his heartbeat for the last time after he released one peaceful, child-like sigh. She could swear she felt his fingers twitch against hers in that last moment. For hours, she lay on him, feeling his body grow colder than the North she now claimed. She did not cry for she was now stone. She stood and straightened her hair and dress. She brushed his hair out of his face. She placed a final kiss on his cold, cruel mouth. She opened the door and called for Arya. Plans for war needed to be made. 

  


**For Sandor and for Winterfell, she would sing a long, steel song.**


End file.
